Developing new content can be a tricky business. Google's algorithms reward new, original content, so you need to keep generating material. At the same time, your website isn't there for clicks. Rather, it serves to draw attention to your brand from the current and potential customers in your market.

To make sure you are doing this effectively, you should make sure you are developing content that keeps both your brand and your customers in mind. You are not marketing to the world; you are marketing to people who will appreciate and benefit from who you are and what you do. Keep your content focused to get the most effective results from your website marketing efforts.

Understand Your BrandAs a person or as a business, growth can change you. While you want to evolve to meet new and emerging needs for your customer base, the most successful business owners find ways to stay true to who they are. If you have a mission statement that helps focus your branding, no content you post should work against what you identify as your mission.

If you do not have a mission statement, you should look at what you do, how you do it, and why you do it. When you develop content for your website, all of this should inform the topics you cover, and the style with which you write about them. A playful brand should incorporate humor or a lighter style, while a brand grounded in deep expertise might focus on a more serious style.

Whatever you do, avoid content that goes against the identity you forge for yourself. Every person has layers; no one is one thing all the time. Your brand, though, reflects particular ideas and values. Stay consistent to who you are to build a content library that builds on your brand.

Know Your CustomersWho you are is only a starting point. You need to reach people too. Businesses rarely succeed by trying to be all things for all people. Instead, take the time to think about who your customers are. What do they care about? What references and topics will resonate with them? This should be part of any decision you make to add content to your online marketing program.

Part of this is demographic. If your customers are coming to a brick and mortar location, you should use content that focuses them in on that location. An article highlighting the Louvre will not help your efforts to bring customers to Paris, Texas. Both your local SEO and your topics should focus in on who you can convert into a customer.

If you sell online, of course, your local understanding will probably take less of your focus. Still, you can collect data on who makes purchases with you. Identify trends and look to identify common threads. If your customers have identifiable interests or concerns in their everyday lives, you should use that information to speak to them. Keep looking for topics that not only reflect you and your business, but resonate with the people most critical to your success.

Make Sure Your Dots ConnectUnderstanding yourself and the customers you want to reach gets you a long way. Even so, your job in content marketing does not end when you develop a release schedule, or even when you post your new content. You should be measuring the results you find over time. You often do not know what content will make the biggest impact until you see the response. Looking back to identify the best results helps you refine what you do going forward.

Clicks and page impressions should serve as a starting point. If no one sees content, it matters little whether it is brilliant or impeccably written. Still, that only tells part of the story. You need to track time on page, click-throughs, and conversions to get a fuller sense of what both brings in readers and converts them into actual customers.

As you track, make note of the kinds of content that do well. When a post gains attention, take time to learn what made it do so. If particular posts give you high conversion rates, look for ways to replicate your success there as well. You should constantly be assessing and refining your approach to make sure your efforts yield the kind of results you need.

How New York Ave Can HelpBuilding your content strategy should be a personal thing for any business. You are telling your story, one post at a time, to your customers. At New York Ave, we take the time to talk to you and understand who you are and where you want to go. We then work with you throughout the process of creating and growing your content marketing strategy.